Saturday, February 28, 2015

Speaking of Leonard Nimoy, Hollywood writer Mark Evanier has a great Nimoy anecdote over at his blog News From ME. Check it out here.

Speaking of Spider-Man, pop culture site Dial B for Blog has a fantastic multi-part analysis of the creation of the wall crawler. The articles are well-researched and fascinating, but I don't necessarily agree with all of blogger Robby Reed's conclusions. While Steve Ditko is a genius, I don't look at Ditko as sole creator of the character and Stan Lee as a glorified typist. Not to take a shred of credit from Ditko's design work, art and plots, but I don't believe things were that simple. Would he have been the same character without Lee's brilliant dialog and characterization? Decide for yourself, part one can be found here.

I
suppose everyone knows by now. A sad, sad day. I loved this actor and his most
famous character since I was very young. My life would not be quite as enjoyable
without them. A man who created from scratch one of the most wholly realized fictional
characters ever. Thanks for the wonderful memories, Mr. Nimoy.

Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Spider-Man is Marvel’s greatest
character and probably my favorite comic character of all time. Like so many
nerds of my generation, I grew up reading Spider-Man comics, and along with
Superman and Batman, his were the first comics I remember reading. This first Spider-Man
volume of Marvel’s magnificent Epic collections collects Amazing Fantasy #15, Amazing
Spider-Man #1-17 and Amazing
Spider-Man Annual #1. I’ve read most of these stories before in various
reprint editions, but it’s great to have them restored, recolored and in order.

From Spider-Man's Debut in Amazing Fantasy #15

Spider-Man debuted, of course, in Amazing
Fantasy #15. Like all tales in this edition, the stories are by Stan Lee
and Steve Ditko (could we pause a moment to genuflect while saying the names Lee
and Ditko?). AF #15 recounts Spider-Man’s
origin, the story of Peter Parker being bitten by a radioactive spider, Uncle
Ben’s death, the burglar, blah, blah. I’m not avoiding the story’s spidery
goodness, but chances are you are familiar with how Spider-Man came to be. It’s
what comes next that blows comics out of the water.

Spider-Man #1 briefly recaps
Spidey’s origin and gets right to the Jameson hate. These early ASM issues had
two shorter stories instead of single-issue tales. The first one is the
beginning of Daily Bugle Editor (and
Peter Parker employer) J. Jonah Jameson’s editorial tirade against what he
considers the menace of Spider-Man. Just when Spidey thinks he will bask in the
glory and gratitude of the folks he saved, people start throwing cans at him
because of Jameson’s articles. Even when Spider-Man saves the life of Jameson’s
astronaut son he can’t catch a break. Of course Jameson accuses Spidey of
sabotaging the rocket launch in the first place. It takes until ASM #10 for
Jameson to truly admit why he hates Spider-Man so much. It’s a powerful scene
and well worth the wait. The second story introduces the Chameleon, the
international master of disguise. This is also when Spider-Man tries to join
the Fantastic Four, thinking their huge salaries will make him comfortable
while he fights crime. When he finds out that’s not the case, and they don’t
want him anyway, he’s kind of a jerk about it. Peter Parker can be a petulant
teenager.

Spider-Man vs. The Vulture

Stan and Steve were on a character-creating tear in this first year
of the book. Issue #2 introduces the Vulture and the Terrible Tinkerer to
Spidey’s rogues gallery. Ditko begins each issue with a full page of Spider-Man
engaging the main villain, and those splash pages are spectacular. Issue three
is the first issue-length story, as one of the great Spider-Man arch-villains
is introduced; Doctor Octopus. Ditko goes nuts with Spidey acrobatically
bouncing off walls while fighting this six-armed monstrosity. There’s also a
fun Human Torch guest appearance (who appears too late to help with Doc Ock,
natch) beginning the mostly friendly rivalry between the two characters. Spidey
is obviously jealous of the Torch and lets it get the better of him sometimes.
Lee is slowly developing the character of Peter Parker here, letting him be
human and have real emotions; anger, jealousy and envy included.

Spidey vs. Doc Ock

Issue #5
debuts the Sandman, who Spidey fights in the hallways of his own high school
and cleverly defeats him. Issue #6 is a rather famous confrontation with
Fantastic Four villain Dr. Doom, as Doom nabs Spidey’s #1 fan (and Peter
Parker’s #1 tormentor) Flash Thompson in a Spider-Man outfit. Spidey leaps into
action to save him with more tremendous acrobatic artwork from Ditko.
Spider-Man #6 brings the Lizard, a villain, like most of these brilliant
characters, still used today. The Vulture returns for a sky battle in issue #7,
with Peter’s confidence growing and people noticing, especially his classmates.
Flash’s best girl Liz Allen develops a crush on him, which Peter does not reciprocate.
Issue #8 is incredibly fun, as the action returns to Midtown High and Spidey has
to stop an out-of-control robot, which is tougher than it sounds. This is also
the issue where Peter and bully Flash Thompson have a boxing match to settle
their differences. Peter has to hold back, but still clobbers a flabbergasted
Flash, who struggles to find excuses as to why he lost to “puny” Parker. Lee is
brilliantly in control of his characters at this point.

J. Jonah Jameson Confesses

Spider-Man Meets the Green Goblin

After introducing
characters such as Electro in issue #9 and The Enforcers in issue #10, Doc Ock
returns in Amazing Spider-Man #11,
and succeeds in unmasking Peter Parker in issue #12 (which of course Peter
wiggles out of). Peter has been dating Betty Brant, who has more problems than
a desperate housewife. Issue #14 is the first Green Goblin. It’s a good story,
but I don’t think even Lee and Ditko knew how important the character would
become in Spider-Man’s history. There’s also a fun guest appearance by the
Hulk, who Spidey punches full in the face to no visible effect. The Marvel
Universe is building piece by piece with guest stars and crossovers galore.
Issue #15 is the first Kraven the Hunter, another exceptional character that
will go out with an explosive bang 25 years later. Speaking of crossovers,
Spidey teams with Daredevil (in his original costume) in issue #16 to fight yet
more remarkable villains, the Ringmaster and the Circus of Crime. The
Ringmaster’s hypnotism doesn’t affect the blind Daredevil, which sets up an
amusing battle with the mind-controlled Spider-Man. Issue #17 features Spidey
and the Human Torch battling the Green Goblin and some nice character work as
Liz Allen and Betty Brant meet and battle over Peter Parker. Lee has fun
putting Peter through his paces—now he’s becoming a little too popular, and has no clue how to handle two women fighting over
him.

Spider-Man Annual #1

Finally, there is one of the finest comics ever published—Amazing Spider-Man Annual #1. What I
would have given to buy this off the stands and devour it as it first came out
(the book is before even my time).
Stan and Steve pull out all the stops. This is the first appearance of the
Sinister Six, as they team up to fight Spidey. Spider-Man has barely defeated
Doc Ock, Sandman, the Vulture, Mysterio, Electro and Kraven one on one, but the
vicious villains combine to create a plan to take him down together. On top of fighting
his six most dangerous foes, Spider-Man’s powers intermittently stop working,
finding him powerless at the worst possible times. The bad guys end up making a
fatal mistake in their plans, but come close to ending Spidey.

Ditko Self-Portrait

The art,
storytelling and dialog of this Annual all come together perfectly. Lee &
Ditko are at the absolute height of their powers. Spider-Man’s confidence is
shot because of his power loss, his greatest enemies are teaming up to kill
him, and he still has girl trouble. Wrap that around some of the finest
Spider-Man art ever created by Mr. Ditko and it ends up as one of the best Spider-Man
stories ever told. The extras of the book are stunning. There are Who’s Who-type entries of all the
villains who have appeared in the series so far, several “Secrets of
Spider-Man!” pages featuring Spider-Man’s powers and equipment, and features
devoted to Spidey’s supporting cast, house in the suburbs and superhero guest
stars. The icing on the cake is a hilarious three-page behind-the-scenes story
titled “How Stan Lee and Steve Ditko create Spider-Man.”

These stories brought
back in full force how much I love Spider-Man and his world as created by Ditko
and Lee. Peter Parker was as realistic a character as had ever been portrayed
in comics up until that time. A real, relatable teenager who was a good person
but by no means perfect. He was bullied. He could be sullen, petulant and quick-tempered.
Through the years he grew into the man we all hoped he would be. The stories
and art still hold up as incredibly entertaining and one of the greatest
collaborations in comics history.

Thursday, February 19, 2015

A hypothetical question: Since
the president won’t specifically name our enemies or anything controversial as
what those things really are, and instead uses Newspeak for everything—what might the current
administration call zombies during a zombie apocalypse? We wouldn't want to offend zombies by actually calling them "zombies" after all. My suggestions:

Sunday, February 15, 2015

What If? is a delightful book of amusing, crazy and sometimes scary
questions folks have sent to the website of Internet cartoonist and former NASA
scientist Randall Munroe. In the book’s introduction, Munroe confesses that he
serves basically as a “Dear Abby to mad scientists.” Although the questions
vary from wildly interesting to truly absurd, Munroe answers each one with
scientific calculations, educated speculation, and an attempt to really
determine what would happen if someone threw a baseball at the speed of light. Some
of my favorite questions include:

Q: What would happen if everyone on Earth
stood as close to each other as they could and jumped, everyone landing on the
ground at the same instant?

Answer, pretty much nothing. The Earth’s crust is
thick enough to take the impact with no damage. The surprise was in finding out
that the entire Earth’s population, closely packed, could fit into the state of
Rhode Island. The trouble would be in getting everyone home from Rhode Island—there
would be a collapse of infrastructure and billions of deaths involved in the
logistics of trying to get the entire population home from one central area.

Q.
If every human somehow simply disappeared from the face of the Earth, how long
would it be before the last artificial light source would go out?

A: An
amazingly long time. The last culprits could be solar powered lights in remote
areas or some of our worst nuclear waste encased in water. Both would last
centuries.

Q. Is it possible to build a jetpack using downward firing machine
guns?

Short Answer: Yes.

Q: How much Force power can Yoda output?

A: Turns out,
Yoda demonstrated the most Force power of any character during all six Star
Wars movies. Can you guess when it was?

Q: How many Lego bricks would it take to
build a bridge capable of carrying traffic from London to New York?

A: Munroe
does the actual calculations and tells how such a bridge would work, but
basically, a lot.

There
are many more hypothetical questions and scientific answers. Other subjects covered
are lightning, speed bumps, draining the oceans, the sun going out, and
guessing vs. knowing the answers on the SAT. What If? is an incredibly fun way
to stretch your reality and look at everyday questions and practical science in
a new, slightly skewed way.

Monday, February 9, 2015

Star Trek/Planet of the Apes: The Primate Directive #2: Captain
Kirk and crew continue their investigation of the Ape planet and end up meeting
Charlton Heston’s Taylor! The Enterprise
team realizes this planet is an alternate Earth as they meet the legendary George Taylor.
Taylor, relieved to see other advanced humans, assumes they have arrived to
help him overthrow the ape government. Kirk resists, but is introduced to Chimpanzee Doctors
Cornelius and Zira and given a crash course in the stratifications of Ape
society. Of course Kirk refuses military assistance because of the Prime
Directive not to interfere in other cultures, leading Taylor to take matters
into his own hands.

This series is a total blast, successfully combining two
sci-fi franchises and two hammy lead actors. Highly recommended!

Rating: ****
out of 5 stars

Alex + Ada #12

Alex + Ada #12: Alex’s friend Jacob arrives unexpectedly at the
house, convinced robot Ada has achieved sentience. She has. But proving it is
another thing. Baiting and pushing her, Jacob provokes action—violent action—from
Ada. Can she control herself before she kills him, as she easily could? And she
now has to consider that if someone hostile to her knows of her self-awareness—both
she and Alex could be in immense danger. Meanwhile, Alex is dealing with his
ailing grandmother, who is sicker than he thought. How much loss can he deal
with at one time? It gets worse when he returns home and surveys the damage
....

Full of mad ideas and intense
thrills, Alex + Ada is
one of the best books on the stands today.

Rating: ***** out of 5 stars

Winterworld #7

Winterworld
#7: Tough guy Scully and his fourteen year-old ward Wynn continue their trek
through the frozen wastes of the north. Only now they have a passenger, the
thief Trina. Wynn takes an immediate dislike to her, jealous of her “adult”
relationship with Scully. The three are being followed by a group of
rapscallions Scully ticked off years ago, and the bad guys finally catch up. In
this world, that’s really holding a grudge. It will take trust and teamwork for
Scully, Wynn and Trina to work together to resist this group of armed
strangers. In the end, Wynn and Trina may not actually like each other, but
they certainly get along better. I guess barely escaping certain death will do that to you.

Ace
adventure writer Chuck Dixon turns in another action-packed script that moves
the story forward. The art is by Tomas Giorello and he’s terrific. A worthy
successor to Jackson Guice’s outstanding work.

Rating: **** out of 5 stars

Star Wars #1

Star
Wars #1&2: After decades of fine Star
Wars stories, the license for Star
Wars comics is reverting from Dark Horse Comics back to Marvel. On the face
of it this is cause for regret—if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it! But life moves
on. Judging from this first issue, Marvel Star
Wars comics may actually be ... good?

I’ve enjoyed writer Jason Aaron’s work
in the past, and artist John Cassaday is one of the best comics has to offer. Unfortunately, putting Cassaday on the book guarantees we won’t see another
issue for at least six months, and then he’ll leave the book.

The stories in
this “main” SW title take place shortly after the first SW movie and long
before The Empire Strikes Back.
Princess Leia leads a covert team (including Luke, Han and Chewy) to a planet
that contains the Empire’s largest weapons factory. They slide in smoothly
undercover, but are soon discovered by a recently arrived Darth Vader and his
Stormtrooper goons.

Star Wars #2

Then things start to explode. There is a lot to like in
these first two issues; the banter between Han and Leia (and Chewy), C-3PO’s
defense of the empty Millennium Falcon, and Luke’s novice use of the force. In
Issue 2, Luke has his first face-to-face confrontation with Vader, who makes
short work of him and confiscates his lightsaber. Fortunately, Vader is interrupted
before he can kill him. Many explosions later, Luke has his saber back and Vader
is left with a familiar and disturbing feeling about this young Jedi.

These
issues are delightful and give me hope Marvel may be interested in quality Star Wars comics and not just hacking
out refuse to Marvel Zombies with full wallets. I look forward to their Darth
Vader and Princess Leia books—I’ll definitely give them a try.

Rating: **** out
of 5 stars

Justice Inc. #6

Justice Inc. #6: I’m a sucker for pulp heroes, and to me anything
featuring a crossover between Doc Savage, the Shadow and the Avenger is like
catnip to Simba the lion. That said, the execution of this story leaves a lot
to be desired. Writer Michael Uslan may be a great Hollywood lawyer and
producer, but no one will mistake him for a writer. His handling of Doc Savage
as a petulant whiner is a bit out of character. He fails to make the Avenger an
interesting or sympathetic character, even with the story of his creation and
the tragic death of his wife and child. Uslan has a good sense of history and a
decent grasp on the Shadow, he just has more enthusiasm than talent as a
writer. The art is terrible. I stuck with all six issues because I love the
characters (and those Alex Ross covers), but never again. This is not worth the
money.

Rating: **½ out of 5 stars

Lady Killer #2

Lady Killer #2: Equal parts style and cheek,
Lady Killer navigates readers through the world of a 1960s killer for hire—who just
happens to be a suburban housewife and mother of two adorable tykes. Issue two
takes us into the Playboy Club, as Josie goes undercover as a harried lunch
lady. Kidding! Of course she’s a hot bunny, complete with ears and a tail. She
lures her target into the cloak room and plays a bit of cat-and-mouse until she
fulfills her contract. Pressured by her boss to take another job quickly, even
she is shocked when she discovers the new target.

Lady Killer is audacious and violent
with a solid helping of ironic, tongue-in-cheek humor. The only negative is the
similarity with another “suburban mom as killer” book, Jennifer Blood (although the protagonist in that book killed for
revenge, not cash). Hopefully the story will distance itself as the series
progresses. The art by Joelle Jones is breathtaking and alone worth the cover
charge.

Rating: ***½ stars out of 5

Birthright #5

Birthright: #5: I love love LOVE Birthright and it just keeps getting
better. Mikey is a hero kidnapped as a child and taken to a fantasy world to
fight evil. Grown up, he’s back on Earth now, trying to reconnect with his
family. It seems that Mikey wasn’t necessarily with the winning side in that
world—and not necessarily one of the good guys either.

Mike has dragged his father
and brother into the woods to fight who he tells them is an evil sorcerer.
Trouble is, while Mikey may be able to hold his own, evil sorcerers are a bit
out of the league of a sixteen year-old and a soccer dad. No matter, Mikey has
the matter—and his broadsword—well in hand. The question is, is this sorcerer the
evil despot Mikey says? Or will his untimely death start Earth down the path to
being overrun with monsters and demons?

The
flashback scenes follow a young Mikey as he first arrives on the fantasy world,
meets his allies and learns to battle malevolent monsters. He seems like a nice
enough kid, and even at this age shows grit. What went wrong? The ending is a
huge cliffhanger that takes the story in a different direction and definitely
leaves the reader wanting answers. Great stuff.

Rating: ***** out of 5 stars

The United States of Murder Inc. #6

The United States
of Murder, Inc. #6: Oh Brian Michael Bendis, what are we going to do with you?
The story in this issue is perfectly serviceable and contains a major decision
from one of the main characters. The theme of the book is that the mob controls
most of the east coast of the U.S., Congress runs the rest of the country and
they have an uneasy alliance between them. Overall it’s a decent read. But
Bendis, Bendis, your lazy habits are excruciating! First of all, a typical word
balloon in a comic contains around 18-24 words. A typical word balloon in this
comic contains the “F” word about 40 times. Bendis, even if characters talk
like that, don’t you think it comes off as lazy and repetitive to your readers?
How does this enhance the story experience of this comic? Your characters cuss
a lot. We get it. Secondly, the
stutters. Bendis must have grown up in a house, neighborhood, school, county
and city where everyone started every sentence with a stutter. Every Bendis
character in every Bendis book stutters! It’s lazy writing, Brian! Pick one
stuttering character and Mel Tillis away, but does everyone have to stutter on
every sentence? Here are just a few from this issue: “Just—just why?” “Of—of course
I want them back.” It—it would be my honor.” “This—this isn’t the end of this.”
Which leads me to another annoying habit. Brian Michael Bendis should not be
allowed to ever use the word “this” in his writing. Ever. Take that last
sentence (“This—this isn’t the end of this”). He manages a stutter and to use
the word “this” three times in one sentence! Other egregious examples from this
issue: “... if this happens and no one stops it ... “ “This is something that
needs to be done.” “I’m not doing this with you.” “I can’t believe this.” “I
can’t believe this (again).” “I can tell you this.” “This is not a drill!” “You
brought this in my house!” “Everybody stop and look at this.” “All this s***.” “You
have proof of this?” “You have proof of this? (again)” “This is something
special.” “Not for them this f***** plan ... “ “You have made insane sacrifices
to put this world back together ...” And of course, the above mentioned “This—this
isn’t the end of this,” Bendis’s crowning “this” achievement. Yes, “this” can
be used as an adjective, pronoun, adverb or definite article. But not all at
once in the same sentence! FIND ANOTHER WORD. None of these habits are limited
to this comic. This is all of Bendis’s work. Yes, I said “this.”

Unfortunately,
there are other problems with the book. The printing is murky and the coloring and palette are downright ugly. In the first
few pages, humans are colored green and the backgrounds are pink and red. Why? The art is crowded and the storytelling is confusing. I’m not a huge fan of
artist Michael Avon Oeming’s work anyway, but this particular issue was not
drawn well. During one action sequence where the bad guys were trying to
extract information from someone, I just couldn’t tell what was happening. This
one was not good, guys. I hope next month’s (or year’s) issue is better.

Thursday, February 5, 2015

Here's an interesting article over at Breitbart News's Big Hollywood about genre author Larry Correia's battle to make the Sci-fi/Fantasy Hugo Awards more tolerant. The article's title is:The Hugo Wars: How Sci-fi’s Most Prestigious Awards Became a Political BattlegroundCorreia has described his struggle for years at his excellent website, and it looks like he and his fellow authors are finally making a dent. This is something folks on all sides of the political spectrum can support--free speech and a free exchange of ideas. Check out the comprehensive article here.